


i can't let you go (your handprint's on my soul)

by marvelsmostwanted



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Infinity Stone Soul World (Marvel), Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Pre-Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Self-Sacrifice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-05
Updated: 2019-06-07
Packaged: 2020-02-26 15:57:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 13,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18720289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marvelsmostwanted/pseuds/marvelsmostwanted
Summary: After Thanos, all seems lost. With the weight of the universe on their shoulders, can the Avengers save the world together one last time? (Post-Infinity War, pre-Endgame.)





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this before Endgame and I took a few liberties with the Steve/Tony relationship, so this doesn't strictly adhere to canon. Mainly: Tony and Pepper broke up and didn't get back together, Shuri is alive, and the Soul World exists. This was meant to be an in-between fic, so it doesn't provide all the answers or a satisfying ending. But I enjoyed writing it, so I hope you enjoy reading it.

****S P A C E

 

There were some things in life that were incalculable. Time, for instance. You could count seconds, minutes, hours, days, but there was never enough of it. You couldn’t stop it, or change it. Well, maybe Strange could have. But he was gone now. Everyone was gone. Peter…. It was too painful to even contemplate.

Life was another thing. You couldn’t place a value on a life. There was no way to make sense of any of it, really - time, life, love, loss. It just happened, and whoever was left had to deal with it.

As the ashes of Peter Parker slipped through his fingers, as his life blew away in the eerily silent wind of a strange planet, Tony realized that he was completely and utterly alone. Helpless. His genius brain couldn’t get him out of this one. There was no math that could fix this. There was no technology that would defeat Thanos, no calculation that would bring back Peter, bring back Strange, bring back the Guardians. There was no equation that could calculate the total physical and emotional loss that had just happened in the universe.

There was nothing.

Tony could feel breath entering and leaving his body, but he had no idea how much time had passed. For a dizzying few moments as he sat back on the ground, looking up at a sky that was the wrong color, he wondered if _he_ had faded away; maybe he just hadn’t fully realized it yet. It would almost be a relief - at least then, he would have a chance of reuniting with Peter, so that he could tell him everything would be okay - but that wasn’t what the universe had in store for him. Tony was cold and alone on a dead planet.

His hands were shaking. Breathe in, breathe out. The ashes kept slipping away into the air, further and further out of reach.

 

W A K A N D A

 

A heart-stopping, deafening silence reigned over Wakanda. Steve felt like he had left his body; the sensation of so many lives just _lost_ at once was overwhelming, immeasurable. His mind couldn’t process what he’d just seen. Bucky, gone. T’Challa, gone. Sam. Wanda. There one moment, gone the next.

As if someone had just snapped their fingers.

Okoye stood beside him on his left, Natasha on his right. Their presence kept him grounded. They were the only thing keeping him from falling to his knees and screaming, _why?_ Why today, why them, why this way? Why did he sacrifice himself in one war only to live to see another day of senseless destruction? What was the point of it all?

A hand landed on his shoulder. It was shaking slightly. He looked over, expecting Natasha, but it was Rhodes.

“Now what, Cap?” His normally lighthearted tone was uncertain, scared. It unsettled something deep within Steve to hear that. Rhodey was always so steady, calm even in the worst situations, a military man like himself. This day changed everything. Nothing would ever be the same after this.

Steve was sure that Rhodey didn’t intend to put the literal weight of the universe on his shoulders, but he found that it was an impossible question to answer. _Now what?_ He looked around to see the remaining soldiers confused, grieving, lost. Steve’s best friend was gone, again. His right hand man. His friends had just disappeared. _Now what?_ The question made him want to hyperventilate and then run, just run as far away as he could get from all of this. Away from the people looking at him expectantly. Away from the pressure, away from the pain, away from the responsibility.

But that wasn’t how this worked.

Steve inhaled. Exhaled. Something clicked in his brain, some deep-seeded training from his Army days.

“Gather whoever’s left,” he heard himself say. “Tell them to call their loved ones. Tell them to go home if they want. But they should understand that going home won’t change what just happened. I’m staying to fight. This isn’t over. We’ll find a way - we’ll. We’ll find a way.” It wasn’t much of a speech, but it seemed to spur action. He saw Okoye turn away from him to speak to her soldiers; he heard Rhodes shouting out to those still on the battlefield.

He realized he was still staring at the spot where Bucky had vanished like he was expecting him to come back.

Natasha’s hand landed on his arm, and he tore his gaze away to find her eyes, searching.

“I’m going to call Clint,” she said gently. “If half of his family just disappeared, or if he - they should know what’s going on.” Even in the face of unspeakable tragedy, she was holding steady. Prepared. Knew who to call, what to do. He was so grateful for her in that moment that he could barely speak.

“Scott, too,” he found himself saying. “Someone should call him. And the kid - Peter. And -”

“Tony’s not answering,” said Banner suddenly. He had climbed out of the Hulk suit now that the danger was gone, and he was holding a phone in his hand. “Pepper isn’t, either. I have no idea where Tony is, anyway. Last I knew, he was chasing Thanos into space after he hit New York.”

“What about the kid?” Natasha asked. “Peter?”

The name caused Steve to bristle. He knew Tony had a connection with the energetic kid from Queens, and it rattled him to think of someone so young getting tangled up in all of this. But there was no escaping Thanos, no matter how innocent you were.

“Peter was with him,” said Bruce. An ominous silence followed this statement. They had no way to contact either of them. They were only two team members, but they desperately needed them.

Natasha’s face was pale and her voice was less steady as she abruptly walked away, repeating, “I’m going to call Clint.”

“We’ll get them back, right?” Bruce voiced Steve’s only thought for the last hour. “I mean - I know this looks bad, but this isn’t - it might not be permanent. We can still try to steal the Time stone back. Right?”

Steve had been asking himself the same questions over and over since people started turning into ash and dust before his eyes. _Too late,_ his mind had been screaming at him as he helplessly watched his friends disappear into thin air. _You’re too late, out of time, you failed._

He wanted to talk to Sam. He wanted to know what Wanda would say about this, if she had any idea how Infinity Stones worked or if there was a way to reverse this. He wanted Bucky back, but that was a pain so intimately familiar that it had already been reduced to a dull ache in his chest. He wanted T’Challa’s level-headed leadership at a time like this, when there seemed to be nothing left to do but beg or shout or cry.

He moved his feet, one at a time, to watch as the soldiers collected themselves. He owed it to them - and to Bucky, Sam, Wanda, T’Challa, and anyone else who had disappeared - to keep it together. He could fall apart later. The nightmares would come regardless of whether or not he kept going. So he kept going.

Just as he had made up his mind not to give up entirely, the surreal noise of a cell phone buzzing broke through the deathly silence.

Bruce fumbled the phone in his hand, and then his eyes widened. “It’s Tony,” he said quickly, before pressing the phone to his ear.

“Hello? Hello? Tony, it’s Bruce, where are you?” A beat of frustrating silence passed, then another.

“Tony?” Bruce sighed after another long pause and put down the phone. “It’s just static.” He ran a hand through his hair nervously. “If he got on that spaceship when Thanos came to Earth, he could be anywhere by now.”

Steve wanted to know - more than he would like to admit - what had happened to Tony. He came when Bruce called because he had picked up the phone thinking it was Tony on the other end. He was ready for their fight to end. Mistakes had been made, and feelings had been hurt, maybe irreparably, but Steve knew that if he just saw Tony face to face that they could fix things, or at least try to work together. He wasn’t sure they would ever fully get past it, but he needed Tony at a time like this. There were more times than he could count in the last few years that he had looked around for Tony only to be disappointed; he often had problems he knew Tony could solve but no way to contact him. And now, there were bigger fights to be won. Their arguments seemed petty and ridiculous in comparison to the battle against Thanos. Steve needed Tony now more than ever.

If only he knew where Tony was.

“We could use him in this fight.” Steve watched as Bruce tried to hide his surprise at this statement. “If we’re all that’s left, we’re going to need all the help we can get. Besides, I don’t know how much you know about defeating Thanos, but I’m not exactly an expert.” The thought scared him more than anything else: What if they just weren’t good enough? What if they couldn't find a way to defeat Thanos? What if it was too late; what if there was no way? Tony would have answers. Probably. Maybe. There was only one way to find out.

“I’ll talk to Thor,” said Bruce, who was almost startlingly calm in this situation. He had seen a lot in recent months. Either this didn’t phase him, or he was in the same daze-like state as Steve and hadn’t fully processed the loss of humanity that they had just witnessed. “He might have some idea where that spaceship was headed.”

“It’s a place to start,” Steve agreed. It wasn’t much of a plan: Find Tony, and hope he had answers. And if he didn’t have answers, then what? Panic together?

Natasha interrupted his thoughts, back from her call. Her voice was heavy with emotion, but she still managed to report to him as if it were just another mission.

“Clint is alive. He’s alone. His family, they’re - they’re just gone. I called Scott, too. He vanished,” she continued, and the numbers just kept adding up; the toll just kept getting bigger and every name on the list felt like a blow to the stomach. “His daughter is fine, though. She’s with her mom and step-dad.”

It struck Steve how their situations were equal and opposite: One family gone, one still mostly intact; four living, four dead. Thanos’ idea of mercy. It was so horribly cruel, so unspeakably unfair that Steve once again found himself on autopilot.

“Hawkeye. Where is he now?”

“He’s on his way to New York already to assess the damage,” said Natasha. From the tone of her voice, Steve could tell that she was worried. And annoyed. “He shouldn’t have gone alone,” she added when she could feel Steve’s curious gaze. “I mean, who does that? Your entire family just vanishes into thin air and you jump on a plane and - where did he even get a plane, I swear to God -” Her eyes had filled with tears, but she didn’t seem to realize it.

“Natasha,” Steve interrupted. Her gaze snapped back to him. “Go to New York.” A plan was forming in his head. An actual plan. “You and Hawkeye take the lead. Assess the damage. Find out if there’s anyone left - anyone - who knows how to defeat Thanos. I don’t care who - Deadpool, the X-Men, whoever you can find to help. Report back to me. Keep the city safe in the meantime. You know how to do damage control, or at least, however much you can.”

Natasha was nodding. She thought like Steve. The world made slightly more sense when there was a plan, a purpose, a mission to be accomplished. “And you? Will you stay here?”

“No,” said Steve. He had a not-great feeling about this, but that was to be expected. Half of the population just disappeared from the Earth. Nothing about this was going to feel right, or good, or okay. “Okoye can lead from here. I’m going to find out if Tony and Peter are still alive, and who they were with, and if there’s anyone else out there left who can fight. In the meantime, Thor can search the galaxies. Reach out to his friends, find out what they know, what’s happening on other planets. We’re all in this together now. We gather as much information as we can.” He said it aloud as he realized it: “Today may seem hopeless, but what it gave us was time. It’s not a race to the Infinity stones anymore. I’d like to get it done sooner rather than later, but the mission has changed. We gather who’s left. We find out how to defeat him. And then we rid the universe of Thanos once and for all.”

 

*

 

On the third day after everyone vanished, a ship appeared in the sky. It careened into a field just outside of Wakanda and for a few tenuous, stretching moments, everyone was on edge, waiting. Then, a girl emerged from the small, broken ship. There seemed to be no one else with her. She wore a suit of armour like a knight, and her face was painted in bright colors. She didn’t look threatening. Well - on any other day, Steve might have been wary of her. She almost certainly was armed. But she wasn’t Thanos, and she didn’t look like one of his minions.

As she approached the border, no one seemed to know what to do, until Thor suddenly shouted out and ran toward her. Apparently realizing that she couldn’t see him, he gestured to Okoye to lift the barrier. “She’s a friend!” It was the first time anyone had seen Thor smile since he arrived in Wakanda. It was the first time Steve could remember anyone smiling at all in three long days.

Thor called her Valkyrie. She was a soldier of sorts, apparently. She ran into Thor’s arms as soon as she saw him, as relieved as he was to see a familiar face amid the destruction. She brought news from outside the galaxy. “It’s the same, everywhere,” she told them in hushed tones. “I left the Asgardians to help on Namir. We got word that Earth was impacted, and last I heard, that was where you were headed,” she nodded to Thor. “So I came here to see for myself whether you were alive.”

“We need help,” said Steve gravely. “Banner believes there is a way to defeat Thanos. We’re trying to find Tony Stark. We think he could have answers as well.”

Valkyrie took a drink from the flask that always seemed to be in her hand, then wiped her mouth. “It will take a miracle to defeat Thanos,” she said. She didn’t seem sad, exactly, just defeated - but, Steve supposed, Asgard had been dealing with loss for months now. “I’d like to believe it can be done, but unless this Stark is some sort of genius -”

“He is,” said Steve, too quickly.

She raised an eyebrow. “Well, then, I hope you find him.” She took another drink. “And I hope he knows what he’s doing.”

 

*

 

Valkyrie and Thor started plotting. No one knew exactly what they were talking about, and even if you tried to eavesdrop, you would only hear snippets about planets no one had heard of and potential solutions that involved mechanical stars. After a few days of this, everyone decided it was best to leave them alone. If they came up with a solid plan, they would share it with them.

On day six of hell, Natasha called.

“Tony’s on his way to New York,” she said before Steve could finish saying _hello._ “He sent a message.” Her voice was clipped, which told Steve that the situation was urgent but she couldn’t stop whatever she was doing to deal with it. Hence why Steve was on the other end of the line.

“I’m on my way, too.” He hung up before he could wonder what the hell he was doing.

 

 

 

N E W    Y O R K    C I T Y

 

They weren’t sure when to expect Tony, and Steve arrived a few days too early. For every hour he was there, he wondered if something had happened to Tony on the way there. Was he hurt? Or had he changed his mind?

Finally, a beaten-looking spaceship arrived on the roof of the Tower. And due to the strangeness of the last several days, Steve didn’t immediately assume it was Tony.

The walkway lowered to the ground, and -

Tony looked like shit. That was the only thing that Steve had time to process before Tony stumbled, and then he was catching the unconscious man in his arms before he could even think about it.

A blue robot woman had emerged from the ship with Tony, and her blank eyes turned to Steve.

“He was dead,” she said without preamble, her tinny voice sounding concerned. “He was stabbed by Thanos, but Stephen Strange made a deal to exchange the Time stone for his life. He will survive, but he is weak. Do you have a doctor here?”

  
It was a lot of information to process at once. Tony was dead? Who was Stephen Strange? Once again, Steve filtered out the confusing details and focused on what mattered: helping Tony. He lifted him with little effort, carrying him like a lifeless rag doll.

“There’s a doctor here.” Steve wasn’t sure if that’s technically what Bruce was, but it would have to do. The hospitals were overrun; half of their staff was gone.

“I’m Steve Rogers,” he said awkwardly to the robot girl as they made their way into the Tower. He wasn’t really in the mood for small talk, but he owed her a great deal. She brought Tony back.  
  
“I am Nebula,” she said perfunctorily. “You should know that I am the sister of Gamora, and the child of Thanos.” She said it like she wanted to get it over with, and that more than anything made Steve receive the words with more confusion than alarm.  
  
“Thanos is your - father?” He asked carefully.  
  
“In a manner of speaking.” She didn’t say much after that.  
  
Nat took one look at them and called for Bruce, jogging off to find him as Steve set Tony down on the couch. He was finally able to get a good look at him.  
  
Tony was covered in dirt, dust, and ash, the same way everyone here had looked just after the battle. He had a cut on his forehead that looked bad, crusted over with blood; he had scrapes and bruises all over. And Nebula hadn’t been kidding: there was a horrible blood stain on Tony’s right side, enough red to make Steve’s stomach lurch, to make him think they were too late, but somehow it had stopped bleeding. The wound was fixed, but Tony wasn’t - he’d lost blood, he was probably fatigued and dehydrated from battle like everybody else, and his minor injuries were adding up.

 

*

 

“No… no… _I’m_ sorry, Peter, no, no no… come back...”

Tony’s voice split through Steve’s thoughts like a knife. He sat up in bed, startled. It sounded like Tony was right next to him, and for a disoriented moment, Steve looked around, confused - but of course, he was alone. His super hearing had picked up on Tony’s distraught whispers, several rooms away. Over the sound of his own heart pounding, Steve tried to focus on the distant noise. It wasn’t difficult to pick out Tony’s voice. There were only a few other noises at that hour of the night: Thor pouring a drink for Valkyrie, Nat softly talking to Clint, Bruce’s distant snore.

Steve could literally hear Tony tossing and turning, could practically feel his anguish.

“Peter, Peter, no. I’m sorry, this is all my fault… I’m sorry….”

Steve was on his feet and halfway down the hallway before he realized what he was doing might not be the best idea. First of all, he and Tony were on tenuous terms at best. It was odd to burst into a friend’s room in the middle of the night, never mind someone you weren’t sure even liked you anymore. Second, Tony notoriously did not enjoy being woken up by anything other than the gentle sound of an AI, or sunlight streaming through a window. Generally, waking Tony up meant taking a punch to the face or a knee to the gut.

“Please, no. Not him. Take me instead… _Peter!”_

Steve made up his mind as Tony actually shouted out. For a moment, he wondered if Tony could possibly be awake, if he was hallucinating or having some kind of anxiety attack. Neither were uncommon amongst people with PTSD. But when Steve opened the door, he saw Tony tangled in the sheets, bare chest glistening with sweat, eyes screwed shut as he tried to fend off the demons in his mind.

Suddenly, Steve remembered a time when he was allowed here. It was painfully familiar, although before, Tony hadn’t been quite this bad; he had never shouted out like that before.

Before, it was a hole in space and Loki haunting his dreams, and then it was the visions that Wanda had put in his head, of death and destruction and nothing he could do to stop it. After Ultron, Tony was different. He was just scared, so scared, and Steve knew it, but he couldn’t help but grow frustrated when Tony would pretend otherwise: It was never fear making decisions for him; it was for Pepper. It wasn’t paranoia; it was just an experiment. It wasn’t guilt; it was only logical to sign the Accords.

Before, at first, Steve often succumbed to Tony’s incessant taunting and snapped back, the two of them bickering like an old married couple. And that initial spark turned into an uncontrollable fire, because even though Tony Stark infuriated him to no end when they were together, Steve suddenly found himself missing his voice when they were apart. They started spending more time together. They discovered that they were more alike than they thought initially: both stubborn, both proud, both lost and struggling without saying it to anyone.

It was Steve who initiated it because he was so sure of this thing between them, more sure than he had ever been about anything in his life, in the past or now. He knew Tony was holding back because he was afraid of coming on too strong, or offending Steve’s 1940’s sensibilities. It was Steve who sought out Tony one night after a particularly hard battle, finding him alone and halfway to drunk on the couch. It was Steve who wrapped a blanket around Tony and let him fall asleep in his arms, Steve who kissed his forehead as he drifted off.

They had stolen moments together after that, sleeping fitfully as one or the other fought off nightmares, but it was never more than platonic. They were caught somewhere between friends and lovers, an abyss that grew so wide that except for in his wildest dreams, Steve had talked himself out of any hope of ever crossing it.

Because about a month after Steve decided to cross the line keeping him away from Tony Stark, he was fighting him for his life in Siberia.

He always did have bad timing.

Being away from Tony for the last two years was not dissimilar to waking up in the 21st century: He felt lost, a bit hopeless, and in his worst moments, utterly desperate. He asked himself over and over again if there was something, anything he could have done differently, if there was any way he could have prevented this. The only answer he could come up with was _of course, you idiot._ There were a thousand moments that could have gone differently, scenes playing on repeat in his head until his shield clattered to the cold ground and Tony was looking at him like he’d never seen him before. Steve was only pulled out of his thoughts when Sam or Bucky or Nat or T’Challa forced him to focus on something else. Eventually - after longer than he thought he would need - he started seeking them out on his own. Two years down the line, Tony was a bruise that he occasionally pressed on, just to remind himself that it was there, but it wasn’t something he thought about every day.

But now here Tony was, asleep and distraught, a scene familiar both from their shared past and from the last two years of Steve’s own life. Two halves of Steve warred within him: One part of him wanted to comfort Tony and never let him go. They could fix this, couldn’t they? After all this time, after Thanos, surely, they could fix this one thing. The other part of him was reminding him that thinking like that was dangerous, stupid, potentially deadly. Even if Tony forgave him, what would happen when they just started bickering again tomorrow?

The decision was made for him when Tony thrashed suddenly, a frown creasing his forehead as he gasped, “Please - not him, not him -”

“Tony,” said Steve sharply. “Tony, wake up.”

“- Peter, no, no, no, I’m sorry -”

 _“Tony!”_ Steve didn’t want to touch him, but he wasn’t waking up. Tentatively, heart pounding, he gently shook Tony’s shoulder.

“What the -” Tony’s eyes flew open and his fist came flying at Steve’s face before he had fully woken up. Anticipating it, Steve easily caught his hand and deftly avoided a kick aimed at him in the same second.

“It’s just me,” he said automatically, before realizing that maybe it wasn’t comforting for Tony to wake up to him anymore. He felt his face flush. What if Tony just wanted him to leave? “You were shouting,” he added softly. “I’m sorry to wake you, but it seemed like you were having a nightmare.”

It was an understatement: Tony was still shaking and sweating, sitting up now but looking the worse for wear. He had dark circles under his eyes; clearly he hadn’t gotten any sleep since being on that planet. He didn’t seem to realize it, but he was clutching Steve’s hand like a lifeline.

After a long moment when Steve just listened to Tony steady his breathing, Tony finally said, “I didn’t think we were speaking.” There was a moment of breathless silence as Steve slowly let go of his hand, and then Tony huffed a humorless laugh.

“I guess none of that matters now, does it?” He lifted his gaze, and the pain was visible in the way his eyes danced back and forth across Steve’s face. “God, it seems so petty now. And to think I was out there feeling guilty about getting the kid involved and Rhodey and then - I mean, the kid’s just gone. Just like that.” He snapped his fingers. “None of it mattered.”

Steve could see him descending into his own guilt. He tried to pull him out, even though he could feel himself sinking, too.

“Tony, it wasn’t your fault. There was nothing -”

“Don’t say that,” said Tony harshly. “Don’t say there was nothing I could have done. I could have been less stubborn. I could have listened to you, and we would have been together, and we might have had a fighting chance.”

“Or we might have been just as screwed. There’s no point discussing it now. What’s done is done. Until we find a way to defeat Thanos, dwelling on the past is only going to slow us down.” Steve could hear the hypocrisy in his own words - if anyone had a tendency to dwell on the past, it was him - and maybe Tony could, too, because he apparently didn’t listen at all.

“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry,” he said in a whisper. “I knew something was coming. I just didn’t know it was going to be this bad. I thought - if we could get some oversight, maybe the weight of the world wouldn’t be on our shoulders all of the time.”

“I know,” said Steve softly. “I’m sorry, too. I should have told you about Bucky and your parents. I should have been less stubborn. We’ve all made mistakes.” He noticed that Tony’s hand was shaking, so he put his hand over it and held tight. “We’re together now,” he said, his voice stronger than before. “Let’s make it count.”

 

T H E    S O U L    W O R L D

 

Peter blinked, then blinked again. His thoughts were fuzzy as he tried to remember - what day was it, again?

The lights above him were soft, and for a few seconds he was tempted to drift off again, to enjoy sleeping in. Except he wasn’t in his bed. The thought ignited a spark in Peter’s brain and his eyes flew open, heart racing, only to find himself face-to-face with a long-haired, handsome man.

“Jesus?” He asked sleepily.

The man’s face broke into a friendly smile. On second thought, he looked a little too unkempt to be Jesus. Not that Peter really had a good idea of what Jesus would look like in person.

“Bucky,” said the man. That made more sense. Peter saw a glint of silver and noticed his metal arm. Definitely not Jesus. The real arm was the one that reached out to help Peter stand up.

“What’s going on? Where are we? Where is everybody?” Peter’s thoughts had started catching up with him, and now he remembered everything: Thanos, traveling to _another freaking planet,_ fighting some bad guys, and then feeling like he was being ripped apart, falling into Tony’s arms before he woke up here. “Where’s Tony?”

Something strange flickered across Bucky’s face at that, but he just said, “I don’t know, kid. It looks like some of us disappeared from Earth and ended up here.”

“Are we dead?”

Bucky looked uncomfortable, but he said, “I think we’re somewhere in-between. I’m trying to figure it out. Hey, where did you come from, anyway? New York? Because the rest of us were in Wakanda.” He gestured to where a few people were gathered a short distance away.

Or at least, it looked like a short distance. They seemed to be in a featureless space. The more Peter looked around, the less certain he was about exactly what he was seeing. There seemed to be no limits to the space. No walls or doors or buildings, just endless, whiteish fog. The only exception was the ground. It shimmered like water, only it didn’t feel wet. When Peter took a step toward Bucky, small ripples emanated from the spot where he put his foot down. It made no noise.

Peter wasn’t religious, but if he had to guess, Bucky was right: This was some kind of limbo. Maybe not between heaven and hell, but between universes or something like that.

In contrast to their surroundings, the people appeared in sharp relief, looking normal - or as normal as one would expect. Peter was still in his uniform, and Bucky still had dirt and blood on him from fighting.

“I was in space,” Peter rushed to explain, trying to make sense of any of it. “I was on Titan, with Tony and Dr. Strange and - them.” He pointed to a second group just as he noticed them, huddled away from the first. Peter wasn’t sure if they had been there the whole time or if they had just appeared, but there they were: Quill, Drax, and Mantis. A fourth figure had joined them. It looked like a talking tree. Peter wasn’t even going to question it at this point. “We were trying to get the glove off of Thanos, but we couldn’t do it. And then Mr. Stark was dying and Dr. Strange decided to save him, and then _I_ was dying and ended up here. Strange said something about - about this being the end game?”

Peter knew that, to Bucky, who hadn’t been there, he was making absolutely no sense at all. Bucky took it in stride, though. “Well, things weren’t going much better in Wakanda.” He put a hand on Peter’s shoulder and started to guide him over to the group. Peter started recognizing faces: Wanda, Sam, T’Challa. The Guardians noticed them moving and they all met in the middle - well, if there was a middle to this endless expanse.

They all looked the worse for wear; everyone was grieving, panicking, or both. It was jarring and unnerving to go from fighting for your life to standing in silence in an unexplainable void.

Quill was the first to speak up, never one for a long silence. “What’s going on? Are we dead?”

Mantis reached out and touched his forehead. “You feel alive to me,” she said calmly.

“I do not believe we are dead,” T’Challa added. “I have seen the other side of life, and it does not look like this.”

Almost no one appeared comforted by that statement. “Who is he?” Drax asked unhelpfully.

“How did we all end up in the same place?” Bucky asked, ignoring him. “Peter and these guys were on Titan, but we were all in Wakanda. And if I’m understanding correctly, then half of the universe just disappeared along with us. Shouldn’t they be in here? Where’s everybody else?”

“I summoned you here,” said a voice from behind them. Stephen Strange looked ethereal here, the only one who seemed comfortable in this space between worlds. He also just appeared from out of nowhere.

“You weren’t there before,” said Peter, his voice going high-pitched. “Right? I mean, no one else saw him before, right?”

“Who are you?” Wanda asked suspiciously.

“I am Doctor Stephen Strange, Master of the mystic arts.”

Sam crossed his arms, looking unimpressed.

Strange continued, “I was in possession of the Time Stone. Before appearing here, I was on Titan facing Thanos alongside Anthony Stark, the Guardians of the Galaxy, and - the Spider-Boy.”

“Spider-Man,” Peter corrected automatically, but no one acknowledged him.

Strange continued, “Upon learning about the threat that Thanos poses to the universe, I meditated to try and find a way to stop him. Out of 14 million possible future scenarios, I could see only one where we defeated Thanos. This is that scenario.”

“The one scenario where Thanos dies is the one where we also die? What’s even the point of that?” Quill demanded.

“I am Groot,” piped up the tree, crossing its arms. Or - its branches. Peter was really going crazy here. Was no one else seeing this?

“We are not dead, as King T’Challa pointed out,” explained Strange. “I believe we are currently existing in the Soul World. Thanos used the Soul Stone to eliminate half of all of the souls in the universe. This is why we appeared to fade into ash instead of dying as one would expect. You can imagine Thanos’ logic: It’s a lot less messy this way. No bodies left behind. It is simply as if we never existed at all.”

“This is the worst pep talk I’ve ever heard. Will you cut to the chase?” Sam asked. “Are we going to get out of here or not?”

Strange frowned. “I believe we will, if the scenario I saw plays out on Earth. When Thanos is defeated, then the Soul Stone can be used to reverse the removal of half of the universe.”

There was a pause.

“So we have to wait for the people back on Earth to fix this? That’s it? We just wait?” Peter couldn’t help but feel frustrated by that.

“Unfortunately, there is little to be done from here, as far as I can tell,” said Strange.

“Wait, but where were you before?” Quill asked. “You just showed up out of nowhere. And you said you ‘summoned us here,’ what does that even mean?”

Strange looked like he had an impending headache. “The Soul World is expansive. It has to be, in order to fit half of the universe in it. You were all scattered about. I summoned you to this particular spot so that I could explain what was going on. I don’t know much more about this place than you do. I’ve read about it, but we all thought the Soul Stone was lost. No one knew where it was until Thanos had it. The Soul World was purely theoretical until -”

“Until we showed up in it,” said Bucky grimly, and Strange nodded.

“Who are these people?” Drax asked again, to no one in particular. “What is this man talking about? The Soul World? Spider-Boy? Is this a riddle?” Quill started to quietly explain to him what was going on while Mantis sighed.

Wanda had been growing increasingly worried as Strange spoke.

“Tell us more about this scenario where we win,” she said. “Couldn’t they also use the Time Stone to turn back time? Why does it have to be the Soul Stone?”

“It could also be the Reality Stone,” Strange said. “One could simply alter reality to reflect what it was before Thanos. Any of the Stones, really, could do the trick. There are infinite possible scenarios. I didn’t see all of the details; I only saw outcomes. There was only one scenario in which the outcome was favorable for more than half of the universe. We are currently on that path, but as I said - it depends on the actions of our friends on Earth.”

Peter wasn’t sure if he should ask, but he did anyway.

“Was Tony alive?” He felt everyone’s eyes turn to him. “In - in the scenario, in the outcome that you saw - was he still alive? Because when we first met, you said you would let me and Tony die before letting Thanos get the Time Stone. Which was kind of harsh, actually, but I understand because it’s like, the fate of the universe and all. But then you traded the Time Stone for Tony. So is that why you changed your mind?” He knew he was babbling, but he had to know. Tony had done so much for him, and for all of them. Peter couldn’t stand the thought that Tony wouldn’t live to see the outcome that Strange was telling them about, the one where everybody lived.

“I saw that Anthony would be instrumental in returning the universe to its previous state,” said Strange, which didn’t actually answer Peter’s question. “He and Steven Rogers are imperative to this outcome.”

There was a tense pause, and then Sam snorted.

“Great,” he said. Wanda, Bucky, and T’Challa looked discomfited by the thought as well. “We are never getting out of here.”

“I am Groot,” said Groot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That Peter/Bucky "Jesus?" moment inspired by: https://kirschade.tumblr.com/post/174030124713


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Featuring the heart-to-heart between Loki and Peter Parker that you never knew you needed until now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Forgive my twisty logic. Mostly written pre-Endgame so there's no canon to be found here.

N E W    Y O R K    C I T Y

 

Slowly, but in great detail, Tony told them what happened.

It took him two days after the night Steve found him shouting out, but he finally said Peter’s name aloud. Admitted defeat. Like the rest of them, he had become a person who existed only to bear the weight of what he had lost.

Steve, in turn, stayed up late with Tony in the kitchen and told him about their equally botched attempts to kill Thanos: how Wanda and Vision had given up everything, how Thor should have gone for the head, how Bucky and Sam slipped through his fingers.

They were both struggling to cope, but underneath the grief, there was restlessness. The silence that had fallen after the snap was growing louder each day.

They had to do something.

  
  


W A K A N D A

 

As soon as he was physically able, Tony demanded that Steve bring him to Wakanda so that he could see the makeshift headquarters they had set up there. Steve knew that Tony just needed something to work on, something to _do_ about all of this. He understood the impulse. Sitting around would drive him insane.

It took a few weeks, but their plan came together in two parts: Thor and Valkyrie, and Steve and Tony.

Thor, somehow, remained optimistic about defeating Thanos despite the unspeakable losses they had suffered. It was almost as if everything had gone so wrong and become so twisted that Thor was left with no choice but to carry on. He was on the edge of desperation just like all of them, and for the first time that Tony could remember, he looked tired. Dark circles appeared like shadows under his watchful eyes, and even his long hair was looking a little defeated these days. Tony didn’t understand; weren’t gods supposed to look perfect all the time? It was equal parts distressing and motivational: On the one hand, it couldn’t be good that even Thor was worn down. On the other hand, he was still making plans to defeat Thanos and if he could do it, then so could the rest of them. He gave them something to rally around.

Given his persistent belief that Thanos could still be defeated, Thor decided that the best plan of action was to gather as many allies as they could find, draw Thanos in, and destroy him together. The only issue with the plan was the central part of it: Thor wanted to bring Thanos back to Earth. His plan was, essentially, to head off into space, meet with some allies to announce that the Avengers wanted to kill Thanos, encourage them to make a lot of noise about it throughout the galaxies, and then wait for Thanos to show up to shut them down. His plan involved enticing Thanos to come directly back to Wakanda.

“That’s insane,” Tony pointed out when Thor first proposed it. “You’re going to get us all killed. Was half of this planet not enough?”

But Thor was persistent.

“We made mistakes last time,” he said gravely. “This time, we will not repeat our actions. This time, we will be ready.”

The only one who seemed entirely on board with the plan was Rocket, who immediately volunteered to be Thor’s tour guide in space again since he had so many connections. Valkyrie had little to say to any of them, but they assumed she was going along with Thor’s plan because she seemed to be busy packing her spaceship. (Tony did catch her one night in the kitchen drinking straight out of a bottle of vodka, though, so he knew they weren’t the only ones with doubts about the plan.)

Steve was more cooperative than Tony, as usual.

“How can we help?” He asked. Tony had to refrain from rolling his eyes. Steve was a soldier, even in times of tragedy. It was in his blood.

“You try to find our lost friends in the Soul World,” Thor explained with a heavy gaze. “...Just in case our plan does not work, that would be the next course of action anyway. If Thanos lives, we will have to find another way to get back the souls he has taken.”

“Wait,” said Banner haltingly. “You mean, they’re not - dead?”

“Not quite,” said Thor. He explained that since Thanos used the Soul Stone to make everyone disappear, it was likely that their souls existed somewhere… else. Somewhere unreachable. Someplace that no one had ever actually seen.

It sounded like an impossible problem, but wasn’t that why the Avengers existed? It was quickly agreed upon that Shuri, Banner, and Tony - their top minds - would work on finding a way to discover the Soul World while Thor, Rocket, and Valkyrie searched the skies for Thanos. Steve was left in a sort of awkward supervisory role, continuing to communicate with Clint and Natasha in New York while keeping an eye on everyone in Wakanda.

It wasn’t much. Their plans weren’t great. Making plans after Thanos felt like drawing a map as they went along, not knowing what lay ahead. They were lost. They were clutching at their last, desperate hopes, and clinging to each other because there was no one else left.

  
  


T H E   S O U L   W O R L D

 

It was difficult to discern how time was passing in the Soul World. Dr. Strange had vanished with a vague explanation about finding “the others” and left them alone to contemplate their existence in this nothingness.

They drifted off into groups, and again, Peter felt like some of them faded away more than others. It was as if they were present, yet unreachable. He found himself talking to Bucky, Sam, and Wanda. He had a million questions, and they gave few answers.

“So have you technically died twice now?” He asked Bucky, then flushed. “I mean, sorry if you don’t want to talk about -”

Bucky only shook his head, offering the kid a half-smile.

“I couldn’t die because of the experiments they did on me. I’ve been unconscious a lot. Sometimes I would black out and then wake up as the Winter Soldier, or as myself.” He frowned. “Death was not an option for a long time. And I don’t think this is it, either.”

Peter glanced between Sam and Bucky, who stood together but with their arms crossed.

“Do you two hate each other or not? I could never figure it out.”

“We haven’t killed each other yet,” said Sam vaguely, and that was the whole answer to that question.

“What exactly is your superpower?” Peter asked Wanda.

“The English word for what I do is ‘telekinesis.’”

“Did you come up with the name Scarlet Witch or was it the media?”

“I did.”

There was a pause during which Peter realized that they all looked really tired and helpless. He felt the same way, his stomach churning, which was why he couldn’t stop babbling.

“Hey, what do guys you think Steve and Tony are doing right now?”

“Arguing like an old married couple,” Sam chimed in without hesitation.

Bucky added, “Hopefully planning to save the world under the close supervision of Natasha.”

They didn’t have more time to mull it over, though, because Dr. Strange had suddenly reappeared. This time, he was accompanied by a tall, pale man with long black hair. The man looked pained, hunched over on himself, his face and throat both darkened by bruises. He almost seemed to be physically fading away, like a ghost. As if only most of him made it to the Soul World.

Peter barely recognized him, but the others knew him right away.

“Man, what the hell is he doing here?” Sam asked, uncrossing his arms and moving to stand in front of Peter. Almost instinctively, Bucky mimicked his protective stance. Peter had to stand on his tiptoes to see between their shoulders now that they had created a barrier between him and their new guest.

Dr. Strange moved in front of Loki, holding up a hand to call for patience.

“He is no danger to you here,” Strange explained. “It seems that all of our powers are limited in the Soul World, and he is severely wounded. I brought him here because he knows more about this place than we do. He’s been here longer.”

“What does that mean?” Quill had wandered over to see what was going on, followed by the other remaining Guardians.

“It means that Thanos killed me before he decided to eliminate half of the universe,” Loki spoke up, bitterness coloring his tone. He seemed physically weak, but his snaking half-smile was familiar and cold.

“I ended up here… shall we say… on the way to death.” Loki took a deep breath, and it seemed to rattle his entire frame. “There’s no telling how long I’ll be able to stay.”

“What do you mean?” Peter piped up from behind Sam and Bucky.

Loki glanced at him curiously, then continued explaining to the group at large.

“This place is endless. I’ve explored it for weeks and it seems to have no limit. Occasionally, I stumbled across others, but now it’s positively crowded in here.” The others looked around, but no one else seemed to be present. Loki frowned. “It does seem like the others… they... _moved on_ after a while. There’s no telling exactly where they go, or how long it takes, but there is no question in my mind: while the space here is endless, our time here is limited.”

“So you’re saying that if we stay here too long, we will… move on?” Wanda asked warily.

“He is saying that we are dying,” Mantis translated. “The universe will not allow us to be stuck in limbo forever.”

Quill sighed. “Come on, man. We all just faded away from the Earth and now we’re just waiting to start fading out of this place, too? This sucks.”

“Actually, if it sucked, we would be in a black hole,” said Drax. “And by now, our bodies would have been ripped apart limb by limb.” He laughed as if this were a great joke that no one else was in on.

“Cool,” said Sam flatly.

 

*

 

Loki remained within sight, but no one would go near him after he had given them the ominous news that they were all slowly fading away. Again.

Peter could see him sitting alone a short distance away. Like with everybody else, sometimes Loki appeared to be just a few yards away, while at other times Peter would look up and barely be able to see him. The dimensions of space and time were different here. If it weren’t so terrifying, Peter might have been fascinated by the physics of it. As it was, he could only wonder if there was any way for them to get out of here.

“Don’t go near him,” said a voice to his left, and he turned to see Sam with his arms crossed again, eyes on Loki. “He tried to destroy Earth once and nearly succeeded. I wouldn’t put it past him to try and destroy this place, too,” he told Peter darkly.

“Dr. Strange said his powers wouldn’t work here,” Peter pointed out.

Sam didn’t look convinced. “Yeah, well, I don’t mess with magic. Just stay away. We don’t need any more trouble than we’re already in.”

At that moment, Bucky appeared at Sam’s side. “Wanda might know something about the Soul Stone,” he said without much optimism. “She wants to talk to us.”

Peter started to follow them, but Bucky turned and put a hand on his chest.

“Look, I know you want to help, but we might have some tough decisions to make here. That’s not your responsibility. Let us handle it. You… keep an eye on him.” He glanced toward Loki.

As Sam and Bucky faded into the foggy, featureless distance, Peter did as he was told, even though he knew Bucky was just trying to distract him. It was incredibly frustrating that even here, in existential limbo, the adults didn’t want his help.

He would just have to find his own way to help, then.

It took longer than he thought and also no time at all to reach Loki.

Close up, the God of Mischief looked the worse for wear: he was thin, bruised, and clearly tired. It seemed like his injuries from a past fight were frozen in time, still there but not healing.

Despite his wounded outward appearance, he still managed to sound composed, his gaze alert as it flickered over Peter.

“Mr. Parker,” said Loki smoothly. “I was wondering when curiosity would get the better of you.”

Peter took a deep breath so that his voice wouldn’t shake. His heart was beating uncomfortably fast.

“Can you help us get out of here?”

Loki tilted his head, thinking.

“I don’t know. I was sort of hoping that my dear brother might find a way to contact me. There’s not much for me to work with here.” He gestured to the expansive nothingness around them.

“Your brother is Thor, right? Thor’s so cool,” said Peter reverently. The second part was added as an afterthought, and he flushed bright red. “I mean, I wish he would contact us. Or maybe Mr. Stark could figure something out. Do you think -”

“I think you’re going to be just fine,” said Loki in an oddly gentle tone. It was the first comforting thing Peter had heard in a while, and his surprise must have shown on his face.

“What makes you say that?” He asked cautiously.

Loki smiled halfway, almost indulgently.

“None of them,” he gestured vaguely to the group of adults a short distance away, “are going to let anything happen to you. If they find out that only one of us is getting out of here, it will be you.”

Peter swallowed that statement with a certain amount of discomfort. He realized that Loki was probably right. _We might have some tough decisions to make here,_ Bucky had said _._ Just like Mr. Stark was always determined to keep him safe back home, Sam and Bucky were trying to protect him here, too.

Didn’t any of them realize that Peter was just as invested in keeping _them_ safe?

“Oh,” Loki interrupted his thoughts as if he could read them. “Don’t feel guilty about it.”

Peter looked down at his shoes, avoiding Loki’s gaze and focusing instead on shimmery, mysterious ground beneath his feet.

“They don’t treat me like one of them,” he explained. He wasn’t sure why he was telling Loki this. “I’m not - I’m not more important than any of them just because I’m younger. I wish they would just treat me like everybody else.”

“But you aren’t just like everybody else, are you?” Loki asked. Before Peter could get insulted, the god continued, “You’re far too young to know what it takes to be a hero. The sacrifices. The sleepless nights. The things you thought you would never be capable of doing, but did anyway.”

Peter’s mind flashed to Germany, to fighting Captain America at an airport before Tony finally told him to just stay down. He thought of a ship breaking in two before his eyes, and his desperate attempts to fix it before Tony arrived to save the day again.

And just like that, Peter was tearing up. He always wanted to do things himself, and this was no exception - it was incredibly frustrating to be told by Strange to just wait - but at the same time, Peter would give anything to have Tony burst in and save the day right now. What if Tony couldn’t save him this time? What if Tony just thought they were dead, and right now he was alone and scared in space?

“Don’t… don’t do that,” said Loki awkwardly as Peter wiped at his eyes, embarrassed. “There, now… I’m sure the Midgardians will figure it out soon.”

“I just wish there was some way I could help,” Peter said thickly. He was exhausted, injured, and scared. Sitting around was only fraying his nerves further. “I felt like I was helping when I followed Mr. Stark to fight Thanos, but then… but then… one minute I was on Titan, and then the next thing I knew I was here. And now I’m useless again.”

Loki perked up, suddenly curious.

“Well, there is one way you could help,” he said with a careful glance to where Bucky and Sam stood with Wanda. There seemed to be a widening expanse between them. “Tell me what happened on Titan when you met Thanos. What do you know?”

  
  


W A K A N D A

 

There was a shift in the air when Thor, Valkyrie, and Rocket took off. The only ones remaining were Shuri, Okoye, Steve, Tony, Bruce, and a handful of grieving soldiers. Clint and Natasha stayed in New York to do damage control. No one said it out loud, but “damage control” was really code for _making sure we have a future, just in case this is permanent._ None of them knew what to expect.

Tony, Shuri, and Bruce put their minds together to try and figure out the dynamics of the Soul Stone, but it turned out they weren’t necessary.

Nebula, who had kept to herself since her arrival with Tony, turned out to be the most valuable resource they had.

She spent most of her time in her room, and only came out occasionally to listen in on their plans and offer quiet suggestions. Steve was sure she knew more than she was letting on, and he finally found out that he was right one day when she cornered him and Tony in the kitchen.

“My sister, Gamora,” she explained to them in her tinny voice, “is dead. Not in the Soul World like the others. Truly dead. Thanos killed her before all this happened.”

She didn’t look or sound particularly emotional about it, and Steve suspected she had done her grieving privately.

He said, “I’m sorry to hear that,” anyway because it was how his mom had raised him

“Thanos killed her to get the Soul Stone.” Nebula tilted her head, her dark eyes alternately lingering on Steve and Tony.

She explained to them how Thanos had to sacrifice someone he cared about in order to get the Stone. Gamora was probably the only person he had ever cared for enough to qualify, so she had been doomed from the start of his quest for the Infinity Stones.

As Nebula told her sordid tale, Tony started shifting uncomfortably beside Steve. At first, Steve chalked it up to lingering trauma, but he glanced over to find an all-too-familiar expression on Tony’s face: He had clearly stopped listening to the story a while ago, his gaze distant. Steve could practically hear gears whirring in his head. It warmed his heart a bit to see Tony back to his normal self, even just for a moment.

Nebula had told them her story for a reason, of course.

“Thanos used the Soul Stone to eliminate half the universe because it is the most difficult process to reverse.”

“How do we reverse it?” Steve knew he would probably regret asking.

Nebula was hesitant at first, but then she dove right in with her explanation. Apparently, traveling through space had given her a lot of time to think this through.

“There are rumors that when someone is sacrificed for the Soul Stone, that person remains in limbo, so to speak,” she said. “The theory is that the Soul Stone works because it possesses the sacrificed soul. If it is stolen or lost, or if a new sacrifice is made, then the person wielding it is no longer worthy. And the sacrificed soul would leave limbo and move on to death.”

“This is a terrible bedtime story,” muttered Tony, who seemed to have tuned back in.

Ignoring that, Nebula continued, “Theoretically, then, Gamora is still in that limbo. Caught between worlds. If someone _new_ were to be sacrificed for the Stone, then they would take Gamora’s place and Thanos would no longer be worthy of it. The Stone would become the property of its new host.” Her expression hardened. “I do not believe Thanos loves anybody else in this universe like he loved Gamora, so he would be unable to get the Stone back.”

“Wait,” said Steve. “So doesn’t that mean that people who wanted it could keep sacrificing their loved ones to get the Stone?”

“Technically, yes,” said Nebula, “which is why the location of the Soul Stone is such a closely guarded secret.” She tilted her head. Her dark eyes and expressionless face made her seem emotionless, telling them the logical truth even though it was painful to hear it. “What I’m telling you is that one sacrificed soul could save half the universe.”

“It’s not ideal,” started Tony.

“Who would we sacrifice?” Steve demanded. “I mean - I’m willing to go, but -”

“Whoa, whoa, slow down, buddy,” said Tony, turning to him with an indignant expression. “ _I’ll_ go, and you can just -”

“Hey!” Nebula snapped. “Before either of you jump off a cliff, you should know that the sacrificed soul may not be able to be brought back with everyone else. I’m not clear on exactly how it works. But the person with the Soul Stone should be able to go to the Soul World and snap their fingers, so to speak, to bring everyone back. I’m not sure if that includes the sacrificed person.”

“So whoever we sacrifice has a 50-50 chance of being brought back or gone forever?” Steve clarified.

“They will either live or they will die,” Nebula unhelpfully confirmed.

“You know,” said Tony with a thoughtful tilt to his head, “you could have saved us all a lot of time here if you just said, ‘You’ll need to push someone off a cliff and see what happens.’”

 

*

 

So there was a new plan.

The new plan was mostly the same plan, except that in addition to Thor’s army, Clint and Natasha’s backup, and the remaining soldiers’ best efforts, they would also be depending on Steve and Tony to sacrifice someone to get back the Soul Stone.

They told no one.

They acted as if the Soul World was still a mystery to them, and meanwhile, they plotted their own demise. They would wait for Thor to carry out his plan, because there was a slim possibility that it would work, and as Tony pointed out, “The fewer literal human sacrifices we need to make, the better.”

For the first time, Steve felt a spark of hope, knowing there was a solid plan in place. Even if Thor couldn’t defeat Thanos, they would take the Soul Stone, bring back everybody else, and defeat him with the full force of the Avengers back in play. Of course, his optimism was tempered by the knowledge that he wouldn’t be around to see it.

Death was not new to Steve; he had been around it all his life, especially in war, and he knew better than to live out what were potentially his last days in fear of it. He wasn’t exactly looking forward to it, but they were nearly out of other options. It was out of his control.

He had died and come back once, but that wouldn’t happen again. If they couldn’t defeat Thanos, then this was the end of the line.

  
  


T H E    S O U L    W O R L D

 

Loki was a patient listener. He let Peter ramble on about Dr. Strange and Banner and Tony, and going to other planets, and meeting the Guardians of the Galaxy, and finally, encountering Thanos. He was most interested in the part where Tony was dying and Strange exchanged the Time Stone for his life. Like Peter, he seemed to find it unusual.

Before Peter could ask him about it, though, they were interrupted.

Sam literally took Peter by the scruff of his neck and tugged him away from Loki while Bucky moved in close to Loki, Wanda glaring intimidatingly beside him.

“Wait! Wait.” Peter scrambled to his feet, pulling away from Sam to look him pleadingly in the eye. “He knows something. He can help us.”

The other Avengers looked at Loki with suspicion, but this was a strange time and a strange place, and they were in desperate need of information.

“What do you know?” Wanda demanded. “And don’t think we won’t leave you here to rot if we find out you’re lying.”

“I know my brother,” said Loki with his hands raised in innocence, “and I know the Stones. I still can’t help you get out of here, but I have an idea of what they’re trying back on Midgard.” He looked at them each carefully before adding, “I’ll tell you, but you’re not going to like it.”

 

*

 

All of them gathered together again to hear Loki’s idea. Strange, T’Challa, and the Guardians once again drifted back toward them, still looking ethereal in the endless mist.

“My brother will go after Thanos himself,” Loki was saying. “From what I hear, he will be frustrated that he didn’t kill him the first time. Which means he’ll try to draw him back to Midgard.”

“Back to Earth?” T’Challa wondered aloud. “Surely that isn’t the best plan.”

“Maybe not,” Loki shrugged, “but it could take years to find Thanos by searching the galaxies. Much more time efficient to draw him out. However, I’m sure that our friends on Midgard will be mindful of the fact that like the first time, their plan may not work. If they can’t literally chop off Thanos’ hand, then they’ll need a different course of action.”

“I am Groot,” said Groot. Quill shushed him.

Loki continued, “Going after most of the Stones would be fruitless. The Mind Stone and the Power Stone wouldn’t bring us back. The Time Stone could, but again, they would have to take it out of the hands of Thanos himself. The Space Stone or the Reality Stone could also work, in theory, but even if they were able to get one of them from Thanos, they don’t know exactly where we are, so they wouldn’t know how to alter space or reality in order to bring us back. Which leaves -”

“The Soul Stone,” said Peter, realizing it. “Nebula said that her sister -” He glanced at Quill, then continued, “died, when Thanos went to get it.

“It is my belief,” Strange chimed in, “and Loki’s, based on rumors from the darkest corners of the galaxy, that a loved one needs to be sacrificed in order to acquire the Soul Stone.”

“Wait,” Peter interrupted, his mind racing to a conclusion he didn’t like at all. “You said that Steve and Tony were imperative to this outcome. The outcome where we win.” He felt Sam and Bucky shifting beside him.

“Yes,” said Strange, his tone heartbreakingly gentle as he looked at Peter. “I’m sorry, Mr. Parker.”

“So you’re saying that if they go after the Soul Stone - Steve and Tony - one of them would need to sacrifice the other.”

“I’m afraid so.”

An echoing silence followed this proclamation.

“Like I said earlier,” said Sam finally, “we are never getting out of here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, and follow me on Tumblr @marvelsmostwanted for more content/complaining about Marvel/commentary you didn't ask for.
> 
> Update: I’m aiming to post the last chapter by the end of May.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I literally forgot I was writing this fic so, apologies for the delay on the last chapter. I did warn you that it would be an unsatisfying ending. And I didn't tag Major Character Death because... I feel like you had a lot of warning. This is also another warning. It's a short and angsty chapter. Read away!

W A K A N D A

 

Tony dealt with their new reality like he dealt with a lot of things: by completely ignoring it until he couldn’t anymore. He kept his head down, avoided Steve for the next few days, and did his best to help everybody else: He helped Shuri invent entirely new weapons, untested, anything they could use on Thanos; he helped Okoye organize the remainder of the troops; he helped Nebula fix an injury in her wiring.

It took three full days for Steve to find him to have a conversation, and he had to corner him in the one place he knew Tony would be alone. In the kitchen, at two in the morning.

Tony wasn’t drunk, but he wasn’t sober either when Steve turned on the light. Tony held up a hand like it was blinding him.

“What are you trying to do, wake the dead?” Tony complained.

“Actually, yes,” said Steve, but the joke fell flat. Given what had transpired and what they were facing, no one was ever really in the mood to kid around. “We have to talk about it, Tony.”

“Right now?”

“Yes.” Steve was adamant. “You’ve been avoiding me since Nebula told us, but we have to make a decision. You can’t just run away from this. If we can’t defeat Thanos, there won’t be time to argue about it.”

He could tell Tony was about to deny it, but instead of speaking, he took another sip of whiskey. Steve could see how tired he was, how old he looked these last few days. The dark circles under his eyes and the worry lines in his forehead were becoming familiar. No one else was much better off, but Steve still worried about Tony and all that he had been through before he finally made it back to Earth.

“What do you want me to say?” Tony finally asked warily. He put the glass down and leaned over the counter to look at Steve. “I think it should be me. You think it should be you. We’re both self-sacrificing idiots.”

Steve could already feel himself growing frustrated, but he couldn’t fight with Tony. Not anymore.

“Nebula said that there’s a chance the person who is sacrificed might make it back.”

“Yeah,  _ might, _ ” Tony scoffed.

“At least there’s a chance,” Steve countered. “Look, it makes sense for it to be me. Technically, I don’t even belong in this century anyway.”

Tony crossed his arms over his chest. “Even if I was okay with you thinking that way, and I’m not, I don’t want to be the one to kill Captain America.”

“Tony, it’s to save the world. The others will understand -”

“Oh, please. You don’t think Barnes is going to get his hands around my throat the minute he finds out I could’ve gone instead?”

“Don’t bring him into this,” Steve snapped. “It’s not his fault we’re in this situation.”

“Maybe not, but don’t act like he’s not a part of this,” Tony argued, “because they’re  _ all _ a part of this, don’t you get it? If I die, then you’ll all be sad for a while, but you’ll move on. If you die? Cap, I think you’re underestimating how much your annoyingly endless optimism motivates this team.”

Steve was going to pull his hair out. “Tony, do you even hear what you’re saying? This is ridiculous. That kid - Peter - he needs you. He needs you to be here when he gets back. And -” 

He wasn’t sure if he should say it, wasn’t sure if it was okay anymore, but it was now or never. 

“I wouldn’t be able to live with myself knowing that I could’ve saved you. Let me go. Please.”

Tony stepped around the counter, closer to him, and pointed a finger at his chest. 

“Don’t you dare start that shit with me,” he said dangerously, his brow furrowed, “because you know this whole thing only works if you’re sacrificing someone you care about.”

Steve’s heart skipped a beat.

Tony continued, “Nebula decided on us because I give a shit about you, too, Steve, and apparently that fact is incredibly obvious to everyone except you.”

“I know you care,” Steve whispered, “but Tony,” he continued, ever stubborn, “you could - you could move on. Without me, I mean. You already have.”

Steve knew he was being selfish. But he also knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that losing Tony again - losing him permanently - would devastate him. And it would destroy Peter. Tony had to know that.

“I don’t think anything I’ve done in the last few years qualifies as  _ moving on _ ,” Tony said softly, gesturing to the drink on the counter, “and in case you didn’t notice, there’s kind of a big difference between ‘moving on but knowing you’re still out there’ and ‘pushing you off a cliff never to see you again’.”

He picked up his drink and swallowed the rest in one go. Steve flinched.

“I’m not saying it’s going to be easy, Tony. I’m just saying that there are people here who need you. It should be me.”

“Stop - stop saying it like that.” Tony looked up at him.

“Like what?”

“Like there aren’t people who need you, too. Like I don’t need you. Because I do.” Before Steve could say anything else, Tony barreled on. “We need each other. And -”

There was something about the way he said it that sounded hopeless, final.

“We need to let each other go.”

 

*

 

Thor, Valkyrie, and Rocket returned.

They did not bring good news.

While they couldn’t speak for every galaxy in the universe, the galaxies they had visited were devastated by Thanos. The planets they saw were the same as Earth: Eerily quiet and desolate, or worse. As a result, they were unable to garner much support. The likelihood of reaching Thanos by word of mouth was slim. Unfortunately, it seemed that Thor’s optimistic plan to rally the universe around a common cause was unlikely to succeed. They would either need to keep searching the galaxies for him ad infinitum, or come up with a new plan.

Steve watched the way Thor’s expression fell as he told them tales of families torn apart, entire societies destroyed, ancient cities that would need to be rebuilt. Valkyrie was similarly dejected, and Rocket approached them with a slump to his shoulders. There was clearly no room left for hope on that ship.

It was than that Steve made the silent decision not to tell them. It was for the best. If their plan failed, then they would be in the same position they were in now. If it succeeded, then they would be down a team member, but the nightmare would end.

He pulled Tony aside after they convinced the three travelers to go inside and get some rest.

“Tonight,” he said insistently. It couldn’t wait.

Tony’s wide brown eyes searched his for any sign of reluctance, any sign that there was another way out of this. Apparently, he didn’t find what he was looking for. He nodded, resigned to their tied-together fate.

“Tonight,” he agreed.

  
  


 

 

S P A C E

 

Some things were incalculable, and Tony always thought about them in space. How could you pinpoint the value of a life? Could you calculate the depth of his bottomless terror? You could calculate the distance to the edge of the universe, or the number of stars, but he would rather know the answer to the first two questions.

This was only his third time in space, and the first two trips hadn’t exactly been pleasant. This kill-or-be-killed mission wasn’t making him any more fond of space travel. But even he had to admit it was beautiful.

Lost in thought, staring ahead at the explosion of stars, purples and blues and greens painted across the endless black horizon, he almost didn’t hear him.

“If this doesn’t work….” Steve started.

Tony kept looking out at the stars. He was firm in his conviction.

“It will work.”

  
  


 

 

V O R M I R

 

The Red Skull was almost as surprised to see them as they were to see him. Tony only recognized him as the villain from old SHIELD photos, but Steve didn’t hesitate to throw his shield directly at him as soon as he came into view.

The shield went right through him.

They quickly learned that Vormir was not like other places. The Red Skull led them to a cliff, and that seemed to be the only real landform on the entire planet. It was an otherwise endless expanse.  _ A soul for a soul, _ he told them,  _ a terrible price to pay for the wisdom of the Soul Stone. _

After that morbid warning, he only spoke to them once more.

“We’re prepared to pay the price,” Steve assured him, still with a frown fixed on his expression.

The Red Skull had changed, no doubt from his years alone on this isolated planet, and he almost sounded like he had sympathy when he said only, “I sense doubt in both of you, but not unwillingness. Your doubts betray your fear of success.”

“Right,” said Tony flatly, “because if we succeed, that means one of us fell off a cliff.”

It seemed that their host had no more to say, and he left them alone to venture closer to the edge.

They had never come to a decision, obviously. Not in the kitchen, not on the way here, not now. How could they?

They stood side by side in silence for a long moment until Steve spoke.

“Remember when we met?”

“Don’t do this.” Tony glanced over at him, but Steve continued.

“I thought you were him, of course. Then I realized it had been 70 years and even Howard couldn’t come up with an anti-aging serum.”

“Steve.”

“Obviously, we didn’t get along right away, but I was hopeful. Even when we fought, I still knew you were someone who I count on, someone dependable in a world I didn’t recognize. It sounds stupid, but… I felt like you already knew me. And then the Battle of New York happened. When you took that nuke with you into the sky, I really thought you weren’t coming back.”

Tony turned to face him now, chest tight and heart pounding. “Steve, please stop.”

“I thought I’d failed you,” Steve confessed. “The one person I recognized in the 21st century, the one person I should look out for, and I just... let you go.” He turned to look at Tony, and his blue-eyed gaze was set, determined. Steve moved in front of him, which put Steve between Tony and the cliff, dangerously close to the edge. “Tony,” he said, “I know it’s selfish. But don’t make me do that again.”

The fear was crawling up Tony’s throat, choking him, terrifying him. One of them really wasn’t going to leave this place. One of them really wasn’t going home.

“I’m not pushing you off a cliff,” he said, not quite as eloquent as Steve’s speech but the same sentiment nonetheless.

Abruptly, Steve leaned forward from the edge, grabbed Tony by his shirt, and dragged him in for a sudden kiss, the press of his lips like an electric shock to Tony’s system. For a moment of sheer bliss Tony let it happen - and then his brain came back online, he remembered where they were, and he automatically pulled away -

Only for Steve to grip him harder, pulling him closer. Tony could feel his breath on his cheek as he said, “I’m sorry.”

Tony had no time to process. Steve was stronger than him, and he took advantage of that by pushing Tony away, hard. The result was that Tony stumbled backward and Steve -

“No - no, please,  _ NO!” _ Tony lunged for Steve, grabbing at his jacket a second too late.

His hand closed on air and he had a sudden flashback to Peter’s ashes slipping through his fingers, floating away into the still air….

_ You’ll need to push someone off a cliff and see what happens. _

Tony fell to his knees and gripped the edge like it would make a difference if he never stopped looking, like Steve would magically come back if he just didn’t look away. He watched with bottomless horror in the pit of his stomach, mixed with rage and grief and pain - 

As a child, he always thought Captain America was invincible. Steve hit the ground and those dreams shattered into a million haunting, horrible pieces. This planet had killed him, and it had killed Tony. They never should have come here.

He couldn’t even see through the tears. This was every nightmare he’d ever had, come to life. Steve was gone. He was alone.

Tony blinked.

Suddenly, he wasn’t kneeling on solid ground anymore. The cliff had vanished. He was kneeling in a pool of something shimmery and reflective. It looked like water, only it didn’t feel wet. When he lifted a hand to touch it, Tony realized he was already holding onto something.

The Soul Stone.

  
  
  
  


T H E    S O U L    W O R L D

 

He looked like a speck of dust in the distance at first, a dark spot floating on some nonexistent horizon, but Peter saw him right away because there was literally nothing else to look at in this endless expanse.

Loki was fading fast, and the others were pretending not to care but Peter could tell that it concerned them. Even if they weren’t particularly fond of Loki, it was alarming to think that they were watching something that was about to happen to all of them.

He showed up just on time. Peter ran to him, knowing it had to be him, somehow, on instinct. As soon as the thought occurred to him, it seemed like Tony got closer and closer, faster and faster, until Peter was throwing his arms around him with abandon.

“Mr. Stark!”

He couldn’t believe he was actually here, physically, both of them alive to see each other again.

“How did you do it? I don’t know how long we’ve been here but it feels like a long time. Three days, maybe? Or like, a week. How did you get here?”

Tony was unusually silent, but he clung to Peter like a lifeline.

“Mr. Stark?” Peter pulled away to get a better look at him.

His eyes were tired, from exhaustion or sadness or both. The lines around his mouth and forehead were more pronounced than usual. He was looking at Peter like he had never seen him before, gaze moving around Peter’s face like he was taking him in for the first time.

“M-Mr. Stark?”

“Pete,” Tony whispered, then cleared his throat and tried again. “Pete. He’s gone.”

“Captain Rogers? Is he…”

“I don’t know.” The others had started to gather around, having noticed Tony’s arrival. “Nebula said there was a 50-50 chance he’d survive.” Tony’s voice was pained. Peter hated to even think of the possibility that Steve wouldn’t be able to come back with the rest of them. And he hated to see Tony this way.

“Well,” he said in a small voice, “there’s only one way to find out?”

Tony put a hand on his shoulder, and pulled the Soul Stone out of his pocket. It was inevitable. Either they were stuck here forever, or he took a chance on Steve.

“Mr. Stark? I think you have to -”

Tony snapped his fingers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay okay I know... but it's not really a cliffhanger; it's just a choose your own adventure:
> 
> Scenario 1: Steve comes back and he and Tony live happily ever after.  
> Scenario 2: Steve comes back, but as an elderly man,   
> Scenario 3: Steve has amnesia, and the Avengers becomes a soap opera
> 
> See? Lots of fun possibilities. Hope you enjoyed this! Comments and kudos welcome. Find me on Tumblr at marvelsmostwanted.
> 
> \- M x

**Author's Note:**

> That Peter/Bucky "Jesus?" moment inspired by: https://kirschade.tumblr.com/post/174030124713


End file.
